Debian 👍
Do you need a desktop environment with it?
Discussion
the latest version ? . yes i want a dev env. also im considering hosting my domains onnit as well. to see whether i can save up on web hosting fees. since my domains are currently down
if you're looking to save money, have a look at FreeDNS domains at afraid.org. I use them all the time for one-off projects, lots of public ones to choose from and very easy to update DNS records
desktop environments (GNOME or Plasma/KDE) are pretty heavy, the lightest weight one would be lxqt. it is pretty functional out of the box, but takes some getting used to. the latest version of debian has been out for awhile, go for it!
also, why virtualbox? give docker or podman a try
thank you . . ill look these up . the previous time i had the new ubuntu . but i had trouble running it since it kept hanging and getting stuck.
there's lots of little quirks with desktop environments under VirtualBox. (i.e. the login page might not display properly, unable to resize windows). There's stuff you can tweak to fix those quirks with some hours on Google, but maybe avoid the desktop environment altogether and use the server version of ubuntu?
go with the server for hosting and debian for dev work?? or can i use one size fits all ?
of course you can do dev work without desktop environments! That's just living in the terminal all day! 🤣 (I use tmux, vim personally).
There's even fancy things with terminal text-editors like neovim where you can even add Copilot features to it.
If you need to be opening a browser frequently and/or enjoy using a mouse with your IDEs than maybe a desktop environment is better for you
if you're separating out between the "machine" that runs your services from the "machine" that builds the software just be sure to keep your packages in lockstep working between them, keep a note of any that don't line up. Debian might have outdated packages against the newest versions of Ubuntu (cant think of any off the top of my head); no big deal because both are debian-based anyways